The court passed the order after hearing an election petition filed by the defeated Congress candidate Takam Sorang.

Following today’s order, Sorang, who was the nearest rival of Tado, has been declared elected as the MLA of the Tali constituency (reserved for Scheduled Tribes), which is located in Kurung Kumey district of the state.

A single-judge bench of Justice Pranoy Kumar Musahary passed today’s order after hearing the arguments and examining the evidence.

The court passed the order in favour of the petitioner after it found that Tado was declared winner on basis of bogus or fraudulent votes polled in his favour.

The election petition number 1/2012 was registered in the high court on July 31 this year. In the election held on October 13, 2009, a total of 5,261 votes was polled in favour of Tado while Sorang got 2,548 votes. This is the second such instance this year when the election of a sitting MLA of Arunachal Pradesh has been set aside by the court.

In June this year, Gauhati High Court had set aside the election of Congress MLA Gadam Ete in the 2009 Assembly polls and declared his nearest rival Duter Padu of the Trinamul Congress elected with immediate effect. The court of Justice I.A Ansari pronounced this judgment.

Padu, who was defeated by a margin of 30 votes, challenged the result in the court, accusing the winner of resorting to unfair means by influencing the election officials and manipulating the counting process.